~ ~~ An action of Occupy Wall Street

Winter at Trinity Wall Street

Occupiers from Occupy Trinity Wall Street are reporting that the NYPD is threatening to arrest them for sleeping on the streets in cold weather. Apparently when temperatures reach the freezing mark the Powers that Be think it’s okay for non-political, homeless people to sleep on the sidewalk . . . but if you are protesting in the cold it’s off to The Tombs or the Bellevue psych ward.

Occupiers are once again using 60 Wall Street, an indoor public space, for a gathering place during the evening. However, 60 Wall St. closes at 10pm and Occupiers still need to find a place to sleep on the sidewalks. Our hard-grounders still need mutual aid and solidarity as they continue their daytime actions and try to survive the nights. Please continue to donate food, warm clothes, handwarmers, emergency blankets and rain ponchos. Monetary donations can be made to the Occupy Trinity Wall Street WePay page — the link is on the left in the sidebar.

The NYPD is guilty of criminal action in depriving the hard-grounders of shelter — a basic human right. The NYPD will not allow Occupiers to prepare themselves against the weather, confiscating anything and everything that Occupiers can use to keep themselves safe from the elements. Even cardboard and tarps, bare minimum shelter, is ripped away and trashed by the NYPD — although non-political homeless people are allowed to build rudimentary shelters. This denial of a basic human right is part of the ongoing torture the NYPD inflicts upon hard-grounders everywhere, and especially at Occupy Trinity Wall Street.

Before anyone thinks that non-political homeless people have it easy, remember that the Downtown Alliance is working with the NYPD on illegally persecuting homeless people. The Downtown Alliance security (the White Shirts), paid for and directed by the corporations in Lower Manhattan, takes photographs of every homeless person they encounter. Those photographs go directly to a binder kept by Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. Selections are made from the binder at various times, and the selected photos are distributed to certain police units. The orders accompanying the photographs are to arrest these individuals on sight. This is pure persecution, harrassment and discrimination. This kind of police action against homeless people is cruel punishment for being alive — for they have commited no crime in being homeless. No, the only crime here is perpetrated by the society, by the people, who value material possessions more than human life.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly needs to be arrested for this crime. Every Downtown Alliance Security Officer needs to be arrested for this crime. Every NYC Police Officer who has arrested a homeless person for no reason must be themselves arrested for that crime. Every CEO of every corporation that funds the Downtown Alliance needs to be arrested for this crime. Every person who knows about this pogram against homeless people and has not spoken out needs to be arrested for complicity in this crime.

It is not a crime to be homeless.

And let us not forget . . . Trinity Wall Street Real Estate Church is one of corporations persecuting homeless people. Arrest CEO James Cooper!

Donations Gratefully Accepted!

We desperately need monetary donations for food, clothing, medical and informational supplies. The NYPD keeps stealing our property and trying to torture us with lack of sleep, stress and daily-all-day-all-night harassment. Please go to our WePay page to donate and help us change the world for the better.